


Pens

by e_cat



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Lou Ellen would have liked a warning, Lou Ellen's point of view, M/M, Nico secretly likes it, Not quite dating, Physics, Will is an Idiot, borrowing pens, but so close
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-25
Updated: 2015-06-04
Packaged: 2018-03-25 17:39:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3819181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/e_cat/pseuds/e_cat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lou Ellen is going to be in the same Physics class as Will this semester. She was not aware that Will was going to be so caught up in the boy sitting next to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Will Forgets to Forget His Pen

**Author's Note:**

> It's almost the end of the semester, so let's pretend we're back at the beginning and don't have finals soon!
> 
> This probably would have been better from a different point of view, but, well... Anyways, _I_ think it's cute...
> 
> Characters belong to Rick Riordan.

Lou Ellen was looking forward to being in the same Physics class as Will this semester. She’d nearly failed last semester when they’d been in different classes, only passing because of the long study sessions with Will outside of class.

It wasn’t as if Lou Ellen was stupid, though – she wasn’t. It was just that she was pretty sure that she had seen some of those “laws” of physics broken. It was just a little hard to believe that the whole world was held to such a standard.

But it would be better with Will to keep her feet on the ground, where gravity claimed that they belonged. Lou Ellen planned on making Will explain every concept to her at least twice. Which is exactly why she sat right next to him on the first day of class.

Lou Ellen swung her legs impatiently as the other students trickled in. Will didn’t pay them much attention, until one dark-haired boy came through the door and headed in their direction. “Crap,” Will swore under his breath, and he immediately snatched his pen off the desk. To Lou Ellen’s disbelief, he brought his hand beneath the desk and threw the pen, sending it skittering across the floor.

Open-mouthed, Lou Ellen stared at Will, about to ask him what the hell was wrong with him. But just then, the dark-haired boy sat on the other side of Will, and Will turned to face him. “Nico!” he greeted happily. “Can I borrow a pen?”

The boy – Nico – rolled his eyes, but he had an amused smirk. “Really, Will? It’s the first day.” He shook his head in mock disappointment.

“I know,” Will said, pretending to be ashamed. “I’m a disaster. It’s okay if you don’t have one. I can ask Lou Ellen.”

Both boys looked at Lou Ellen, who had to hastily close her mouth and pretend she hadn’t been staring. “Uh,” she articulated.

“It’s fine,” Nico said. “I have your pen.” He dug into his bag and pulled out a pen with a triumphant smirk. Will grinned as he took the pen from Nico’s hand, brushing his fingers almost purposefully.

“Thanks,” he said, turning back to his notebook. Lou Ellen elbowed him, trying to get some kind of an explanation, but Will just shook his head slightly: _later._

Throughout the class, Will kept turning to Nico, or Nico kept turning to Will, and they would have quiet discussions. Much to Lou Ellen’s annoyance, she couldn’t make out what they were saying. Also, if this was how the whole semester was going to go, she wasn’t going to learn anything – she would have been better off in class by herself.

The worst part, though, was when the professor asked them to work on a problem in small groups. Will slid closer to Nico without a glance at Lou Ellen and began discussing the problem with him. She had to clear her throat twice to get them to notice that she was hovering next to them.

Will blushed. “Sorry, Lou,” he said. “Um, Nico, slide over a little so that Lou Ellen can see.”

Instead of sliding to the left like Lou Ellen was expecting, Nico squished his chair closer to Will’s. Raising her eyebrows at Will with very little discretion, Lou Ellen scraped her chair over to the other side of Nico. She was still mostly excluded from Nico and Will’s discussion.

At the end of the class, Lou Ellen packed up her bag with painful slowness, hoping to get a chance to talk to – yell at – Will alone. Nico waited for a minute, shuffling uncomfortably. “Will,” he said quietly, “I need to get to my next class.”

Will nodded, looking disappointed. His expression said that he wanted to leave with Nico. Lou Ellen’s said that she would kill him if he did. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll see you next time, I guess. Here’s your pen back.”

Nico hesitated. “Are you sure you won’t need it?” Lou Ellen resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

“No,” Will said. “I’m good. Thanks.”

Nico nodded and took the pen, sliding it into his bag. “Okay. See you later, Will.”

“Bye, Nico.”

Will and Lou Ellen both watched Nico leave. As soon as he was out of sight, Lou Ellen hit her friend. “Ow!” Will complained. “What was that for?”

“Are you _kidding?”_ Lou Ellen growled. “Go get your pen.”

Will traveled across the classroom to where his pen still rested underneath another table, grumbling under his breath about mean friends. Lou Ellen shoved the rest of her things into her backpack and slung it over her shoulders. She crossed her arms and waited for Will to return.

“When were you going to tell me you had a boyfriend?” Lou Ellen demanded.

Will turned red. “I – I don’t,” he stammered. “I mean, Nico and I are just friends.”

Lou Ellen looked at him skeptically. “Will, you threw your pen halfway across the room just so you could ask to borrow his.”

Somehow, Will’s blush deepened. Lou Ellen wondered if there was enough blood getting to the rest of his body. “It’s a thing we started last semester,” he mumbled. “I forgot my pen one day, so I asked to borrow his. We got to talking, and, well… I may have forgotten my pen on purpose after that. I just forgot not to bring it today.”

Lou Ellen couldn’t help but laugh at this point. “So, you’re telling me that you _forgot_ to forget your pen?”

Will shrugged. “He always looks so happy when he teases me about forgetting,” he muttered. Lou Ellen rolled her eyes and hit him again as she started towards the door. “Ow! What was _that_ for?” Will asked indignantly.

Lou Ellen glanced over her should to make sure Will was coming. “Not asking him out yet.”


	2. Will Forgets That He Has a Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lou Ellen tries to convince Will to ask Nico out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, uh, remember a thousand years ago when a couple of people asked in the comments if I was going to write more, and I said maybe? Because I do, and I feel really bad that I took so long. I had this idea a while ago, and I started it. And then I dropped it for a few weeks. But - now I finished it!
> 
> So, yeah. In summation: I wrote a follow-up chapter. Hopefully it doesn't ruin the story. :)

“So, when are you asking him out, again?” Lou Ellen questioned. This had become a routine – she asked Will this question after every Physics class, just to watch him blush – and from the hope that he would get tired of her pestering and just do it already. Recently, she had made some progress from Will’s denial of his feelings for Nico. Instead, he was procrastinating.

“I have a plan,” he promised. “I just need to get everything sorted out.”

Lou Ellen rolled her eyes. “Would you like to enlighten me on this so-called plan of yours?”

Will shook his head quickly, blushing. “Nope. I’m good. I don’t need any help. None at all. I know what I’m doing.” His words came out at a rapid pace, and they didn’t sound very confident.

“Do you even have a plan?”

“Of course I have a plan!” Will snapped. “I just… have to work out a few details first.”

Lou Ellen raised her eyebrows. “Is that so? Why don’t you tell me about it, then?”

Will’s face was completely red. “You’ll think it’s stupid,” he muttered.

Lou Ellen laughed. “Well, then, it is probably is.” Will looked at her with a hurt expression. “What?” she said. “If you’re afraid that I’m going to think your plan is dumb, then deep down, _you_ think that your plan is dumb.”

Will sighed. “It’s not dumb,” he said, although he didn’t sound sure. “I just don’t want to jinx it.”

Lou Ellen rolled her eyes, not believing him. Knowing Will, he had a really dorky plan, but he was too stubborn to give her the opportunity to talk him out of it. Lou Ellen would have pushed it, but she had a feeling that Nico was going to say yes no matter what Will did. There was no _way_ Will could mess this up.

But if he did, Lou Ellen wanted to see it. “When are you going to enact this secret plan of yours?” she asked.

Will shrugged. “I don’t know,” he said. “Before the midterm?”

Lou Ellen’s eyes widened. “That’s during next class!” He nodded firmly, and Lou Ellen was shocked. She had thought for sure that he would stall on giving her an answer and probably end the year without asking Nico out. She had thought for sure that she would spend the rest of her life asking Will when he was going to ask Nico out. And now he was saying that he was going to do it before the midterm – wait.

“Won’t asking him out _before_ the midterm mean that we’ll all be distracted during the test?”

“It’s not going to go _that_ badly!” Will defended. “And, _all_ of us?”

Lou Ellen snorted. “First of all, unless you’re a bigger idiot than I realized and seriously mess this up, he’s going to say yes. And then both of you are going to be super-excited, and you aren’t going to be able to concentrate on the exam! And I won’t be able to concentrate because I’m going to be watching you two making googly eyes at each other!” She paused with a frown. “Actually, you guys are going to be doing that anyways.” She sighed. “Fine, then. Do whatever the hell you want.”

“No one said anything about googly eyes!” Will exclaimed. He bit his lip. “Do you really think it will be a distraction?”

Lou Ellen gave him a look. “Do you remember when you were talking to Nico today about what the best kind of candy is?” Will nodded, smiling fondly at the memory. “And do you remember what the professor was saying at the time?”

Will frowned and tilted his head. “The professor was talking?”

Lou Ellen rolled her eyes. “Yes. He called the class back to attention about halfway through your conversation. Did you really not notice?” Will looked at the ground. “Ugh, never mind. You see my point, though, right?”

Will sighed. “Yeah. I see your point,” he said. “I’ll wait until after the exam.”

Lou Ellen crossed her arms. _“Right_ after,” she said, knowing she had to be tough with him, lest he put it off anymore.

Will nodded eagerly. “Sure, sure. Right after,” he agreed. Lou Ellen wasn’t sure if she should believe him, but she nodded. It was still going to drive her crazy with anticipation, but she tried not to think about it, trying instead to learn all those farfetched principles and to remember what all those variable names meant in all those meaningless equations.

She didn’t worry about it at all until just before class started when she realized that Will actually had a pen for once. “You forgot to forget your pen again,” she noted, looking back down at her notes while still watching Will from the corner of her eyes.

Will glanced at her. “I’m not so stupid that I would purposefully come to the midterm without a pen,” he said irritably. He looked at the door. “Where do you think he is? He’s always here by now.”

Lou Ellen also looked at the door, but that did not make Nico magically appear. People like Nico tended to defy magic. She shrugged and returned her attention to her studying. “Maybe he’s sick.”

“Sick!” Will repeated, sounding distraught. “Why didn’t he call me?”

Lou Ellen looked up. “Will. Relax. It was just a guess. He might have just overslept. Or he got held up with something. Don’t worry so much; he’ll be here.”

Will looked troubled as he watched the door. “Yeah…” he said distractedly. “I guess…”

Lou Ellen tried to focus on last-minute-studying, but Will’s anxiety was very distracting. Eventually, she sighed and gave up in favor of watching the door. Seconds later, Nico came bursting through. Huh. Maybe Lou Ellen _was_ magical, after all.

Nico’s hair was exceptionally disheveled today, and it appeared that his entire notebook had fallen apart as he carried a stack of disorganized papers in his hands rather than in his bag. “Hey,” he said to Will, sounding out of breath. “Sorry I’m late. I fell asleep studying in the library.”

Will nodded smoothly. “I figured it was something like that,” he said, all traces of the anxiety he’d been expressing moments before gone from his voice.

Nico sunk into his chair and dumped his papers on the desk. A risky move, considering that the professor was likely to start the test in less than a minute. He began digging through his bag, which really didn’t look like it had anything in it. After several long seconds of panicked searching, Nico groaned and looked at Will sheepishly. “Don’t make any comments about irony, okay? But do you maybe have a pen I can borrow?”

Will lit up. Lou Ellen had a feeling he was going to talk about the irony. Probably twenty seconds until the exam. He would have to make it quick.

Will reached into his pocket and slowly pulled out a pen. Lou Ellen briefly wondered why Will had an extra pen in his pocket, but she didn’t have time to dwell on it – and Will didn’t have time to make any comments about irony – because, just then, the professor said, “All right. Everyone clear your desks. You may begin as soon as I hand you an exam.”

Lou Ellen shuffled her notes into her backpack, and caught a glimpse of Nico staring open-mouthed between the pen and Will. Confused, Lou Ellen elbowed her friend and nodded at Nico questioningly.

All the color drained from Will’s face, and his expression was one of absolute horror. Lou Ellen had a bad feeling about Will’s plan to ask Nico out.

Before anyone could say anything, the professor arrived with their exams, and all of Lou Ellen’s attention was diverted to passing. Okay, so more like 40% of her attention – coincidentally, that would probably be her score on the exam.

The hour and a half dragged by slowly. Painfully slowly. Lou Ellen wished she really _did_ have magic, because she would certainly use it to speed up time until the end of the exam. Or, better yet, she would freeze time and make Will and Nico sort this whole thing out.

Finally, the class period reached its end. Nico was out of his seat before the professor finished saying, “Bring your exams up to the front.” He brought his bag with him.

Will looked disappointed, and Lou Ellen could only offer, “At least he kept the pen. Am I correct in surmising that you wrote ‘Will you go out with me?’ on the pen?”

Will sighed and nodded, grabbing his bag as he headed to the front of the room with his exam. Lou Ellen figured that he was going to try to catch Nico before he left. Lou Ellen did not bring her bag, because she was no longer certain that she wanted to see this.

They handed in their tests and Will rushed out the door. Lou Ellen headed back to her desk to grab her things. As she headed across the nearly empty classroom to the door, she heard voices in the hallway.

“You’re an idiot,” she heard Nico say. Did he sound… _affectionate?_ Did she dare to hope?

Will laughed – _laughed!_ “I know,” he said, sounding relieved. She dared!

Lou Ellen finally reached the door and spilled out into the hallway. And there were Nico and Will. They weren’t talking anymore.

Nico’s hands were in Will’s hair, probably in an effort to make it look as bad as his own. Will had one hand on Nico’s hip, and the other braced on the wall behind his head. And, yes, they were kissing.

Lou Ellen squealed with joy – only Will could mess up a plan this well! They either didn’t hear her, or didn’t care. Lou Ellen hastily took out her phone and snapped a picture for blackmail. If she played her cards right, she might just make it through Physics.


End file.
